Characters / Johnny the Walrus

Characters appearing in Johnny the Walrus.

Johnny

The titular character. A child with an active imagination who loves to pretend to be animals. After pretending to be a Walrus for fun he’s mistaken for a thinly veiled metaphor for a transgender child.

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• Aesop Collateral Damage: Johnny must suffer for his mother to learn her lesson about forcing a child to transition to keep up with what people online want.
• Disappeared Dad: No explanation is ever offered for what happened to Johnny’s father.

Johnny’s Mother

Johnny’s unnamed mother whose posts on the Internet spark the entire plot of the book.

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• Abusive Parents: Accidentally becomes this towards Johnny thanks to having a compulsive need to win the approval of online media scolds. Her realizing this leads to her learning her lesson.
• Character Development: She starts off as a borderline moral coward readily caving to public pressure to let Johnny be a Walrus “or they’ll say I’m phobic”, but by the end she’s learned to ignore what her online critics say about her.
• Heel Realization: Has one of these after the Zookeeper convinces her it would be wrong to treat Johnny as if he were a Walrus rather than a boy.
• Parental Abandonment: Almost leaves Johnny at a Zoo so that he can live as a Walrus though the Zookeeper talks her into regaining her senses.
• No Name Given: She is only ever called Mommy within the text. No mention is made of her real name.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: She inadvertently starts the entire problem for Johnny by posting on the Internet about him pretending to be a Walrus.
• Slave to PR: Deconstructed. Her attempts to be well-liked by the people on the Internet leads to her nearly ruining her son’s life.
• Straw Character: She represents Matt Walsh's idea of supportive parents of trans children, namely that they are concerned with placating the demands of so-called "woke political activists".

The Public

The voices on Johnny’s mother’s phone demanding she transition Johnny from humanhood to Walrushood.

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• Apathetic Citizens: Inverted. Not only do they care about their fellow citizens, they actively seek to shame and punish those who don’t behave in the manner they deem best for society.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: One of the protestors holds a sign saying “human walruses are real walruses.”
• Insane Troll Logic: Believe that a child calling himself a Walrus means he must literally be a Walrus.
• Obliviously Evil: Are completely unaware of how they cause Johnny to suffer.
• Strawman Political: Function as a caricature of the Left, showing them as an ignorant mob who only make accusations of bigotry rather than say anything substantial.

The Doctor

A physician Johnny’s mother asks to transition Johnny into a Walrus.

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• Allegorical Character: Represents real world medical professionals who encourage children to transition.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Is only ever referred to by his profession.
• Obliviously Evil: It never seems to occur to him that his prescribed treatment would cause lasting damage to Johnny.

The Zookeeper

A man who works at the zoo and tells Johnny's mother to protect her son.

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• Author Avatar: The illustrator K. Reeves drew the Zookeeper to look like Matt Walsh. The Zookeeper also served as a mouthpiece for Walsh’s actual opinions.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": Only ever called the Zookeeper.
• Only Sane Man: Being the only character to listen to Johnny and acknowledge that Johnny is not a Walrus but a boy, the Zookeeper is very much the voice of reason.

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